Any plans for a new challenge?

[ElizabethHerts]

Now we have come to the end of 6x-great-grandparents, will there be a new challenge to tax our brains and make us focus on our trees?
I would certainly welcome it. :)

[kiterunner]

Anybody got any ideas for one? I don't think we should do 7xg-grandparents.

[ElizabethHerts]

Yes, Kate, perhaps 7x-great-grandparents might be a step too far. Too many blank weeks.

It needs to be something to focus us on ancestors where there might be more information available now. It's difficult to know how to do this.

[Olde Crone]

Brick walls?

OC

[JBee]

Maybe just a thread called "Brick Walls"?

Week 1 - names looked at for one week - limited to one name/couple per member
Week 2 - new set of names
Week 3 - again a new set and so on

Many of mine aren't direct line but a case of what happened to great great uncle etc.

[JBee]

Snap OC

[Phoenix]

Perhaps different sorts of records? A county a week with people adding what they know. It amazes me just how much I forget to look at.

I agree totally that 7th gg shows up the defiencies in my tree (virtually nothing at all on my father's side) but we could have awkward ancestors: ANY 7th and above ancestors in 8 groups from gg granny back.

[ElizabethHerts]

I like the brick walls suggestion, which is something I had thought of. The way we approach it would be important to involve as many people as possible.

I also like Phoenix's idea of focussing county by county. I know we have record sets added for each county as they become available, but perhaps we need to focus hard county by county to ensure people know all the available records to view or access so as to get further in their research.

[marquette]

I like both suggestions.

My brickwalls could do with a little prodding, but with my ancestors with backgrounds in at least 10 different counties, it could be helpful to concentrate on what records are available for each one.

[anne fraser]

I like that idea. Say brick walls in Wales or London.

[Merry]

I don't know how I would find brick walls on my tree from a specific place.

[vita]

I don't know how I would find brick walls on my tree from a specific place.

I was thinking that too Merry. Personally, I'll be grateful for anything that

gives me the excuse to post details of my couple of brick walls once again.

[Margaret in Burton]

Brick walls definitely.

Ermmmmm. Peter Henry Harrison? Or is he barred. :D

[Merry]

But don't we just post up our brick walls whenever we like?

The thing with ToG was it encouraged looking at a specific ancestor at a specific time, but "post a brick wall" doesn't encourage me to do anything. I probably have hundreds of brick walls, the majority of which are brick walls for a very good reason! :D

[Merry]

Brick walls definitely.

Ermmmmm. Peter Henry Harrison? Or is he barred. :D

No, he isn't!! :D

[JBee]

Maybe concentrating on Surnames starting with A and working through each week.

[ElizabethHerts]

I must admit that if I get stuck and encounter a brick wall, whether temporary or permanent, I post a query here to ask for help. I suspect that with my more enduring brick walls I have already asked for help before.

I quite like the idea of focussing on a county. Of course, there will be some in which I have no interest, but we could remind people of what resources there are and that might well help find answers.

[maggie_4_7]

Brick Walls sounds good I've got a few :D

[Janet]

What if we broke the work into slices of time rather than slices of geography? I would enjoy focusing on how best to research in a given time period. It would force me to establish a better timeline and become conscious of exactly when and where my information trail peters out on each line. I expect it would also reveal some insights I have not had before about what was happening in the same time frame on different branches of my tree.

I should think we could date a brick wall by the earliest reliably known date before the trail runs cold. Suppose the only known facts date from 1940 or later; that would be a 1940 brick wall. Maybe some of us have such recent ones. It would be nice to have a week or two of looking at the mid-20th century and really dig into the 1939 Register, directories, electoral rolls, and other sources I'm probably overlooking. In the U.S., the 1940 census for instance.

I'm sure that better brains than mine can come up with useful cutoff points for earlier times. Before and after 1837 would undoubtedly fall under very different research protocols for instance, and there must be other good ways to divide things up. The very act of grappling with the defined sectors of time and seeing how my own brick walls fall within that structure would already start to organize my thoughts. Would that make any sense to other members?

I do find the geographic approach attractive but county by county won't cover everyone. There is also country by country, and county by county or state by state within those. It gets complicated and some poor people might wait forever. Personally I would rather find my ancestors before I become one. :D

[Merry]

I'm just a bit bothered!

If 20+ people all post a brick wall problem at the same time and then another lot the next week and the next week, who do you think is going to knock down any of them?

[vita]

Good point, Merry.

[maggie_4_7]

I'm just a bit bothered!

If 20+ people all post a brick wall problem at the same time and then another lot the next week and the next week, who do you think is going to knock down any of them?

True, not to mention it could get very confusing!

[Janet]

Hmmm. Make thin slices of time? And/or subdivide the divisions geographically?

Is there any way to do a straw poll and get an idea of how many brick walls we are likely to address, and in what years and locations?

I wonder how many live problems have been worked on simultaneously in the past, and what number would be optimal.

[Merry]

With the number of active members on this site I personally wouldn't want to be looking at more than a max of two brick walls at any one time. Preferably one. Things were different in the past when we had at least 50% more active members.

[Merry]

Surely most of us have hundreds of brick walls on our trees? It would probably take me months to work out how many I have! ;( Most of the major ones will already be on this site.

[James18]

A challenge?

http://www.genealogistsforum.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=24000

[JBee]

Ok still on Brick Walls.

What about a weekly thread where a member could put one of their brick walls which could be picked up by google.

Out of all the threads that week - one could be picked for special treatment/research by members and starred so everyone knew which one. This thread could be chosen at random or by the liklihood of finding anything useful.

As all the brick walls on the thread would still remain and might generate help or interest from other members but the emphasis would still be on the starred thread.

I do recall sometime ago not sure where - a member could put their name forward for additional help - a name was drawn out randomly from however many names there were and that member would receive help with a genealogy problem.

[ElizabethHerts]

We seem to be struggling to find common ground on this.

Alternatively, could we look at a topic of family history which might help locate extra information?

For example, I'm very keen on finding and transcribing wills as that is the only way I have been able to make progress in getting further back for most of my lines. We could run a few weeks where we focus on what is available on the national and county level and look at people's death dates and see if we can locate wills or administrations for them. I know I have found wills for lots of people that other researchers hadn't found. It would be useful as people would learn how to access new information for themselves.

Just a thought. I do realise that there is just a hard core of people who participate in these challenges.

[ElizabethHerts]

For example, people could list:

Grandparents: xx
year of death: xx
Place of death: xx

Great-grandparents
as above

We could list all our ancestors this way (those for whom no wills have been found) then others could look or offer advice where to look. I realise in many cases wills won't be found, but it could be an educational exercise, and some will be found, especially before 1858.

[kiterunner]

That was supposed to be part of TOGG etc, Elizabeth - the templates include a slot for probate details.

[ElizabethHerts]

That was supposed to be part of TOGG etc, Elizabeth - the templates include a slot for probate details.

That's true - but how hard did people look for wills for these people?

[Guinevere]

There is loads available on the web now and more being added. Some brick walls could finally tumble.

[ElizabethHerts]

There is loads available on the web now and more being added. Some brick walls could finally tumble.

That's right, Gwynne. This is why it's always good to re-visit one's research to add new information. So many county records' offices have online indexes now, so it's much easier to find wills than 10 years ago. Ancestry have PCC wills, London wills and Surrey wills, and FMP has Oxfordshire wills and Cheshire wills.
It's much easier to find probate records now.

I remember going into London and ploughing through the probate books, spending all day and going home with perhaps four or five. Now we have the probate calendar online.

[Jenoco]

I'm all for getting help on brick walls! I'm not sure of the best way to break down the many that might be posted, but perhaps by location or time period to start with. Not many of mine have left wills, although I appreciate that others will have ancestors who have.

[kiterunner]

The idea of the TOG threads was for people to take the lead in researching their own ancestors, but with others chipping in to help. I think whatever replaces it needs to work the same way.

I should think there are already threads on here for most members' brick walls, and a lot of those will be TOG threads anyway, so we don't really want to go over the same ground too much again, but of course people are always welcome to bump one of their old TOG threads up asking whether anyone has any fresh ideas.

[marquette]

Now I think about it, Kiterunner, I probably have really posted all my brickwalls on the TOG threads, thats where I run out of information.

What about a challenge to solve other mysteries ? Or suggestions of places to look for information on events or places, other than directly about people ?

For Example: I know that Thomas Brazill, who was ship owner and captain, was captured by the French in the February of 1807, off the east coast of England, and remained a prisoner of the French until about 1814.

My questions are - where is "Besona" in France, where he was supposedly held ? What did he do for 7 years while there ? Could he work at something, was he in a jail ?
The only information I can find by googling is about French prisoners in England.

I also have questions about a paper mill in Berkshire, although I do know a bit about it, and questions about inheritance of such things, when there are no children to inherit.

Maybe others might have similar sorts of questions, otherwise it would be a really short challenge topic.

[maggie_4_7]

I also have questions about a paper mill in Berkshire...

Which one?

[marquette]

Whistley Paper Mill, near Hurst.
I dont want to hijack this thread with it, so perhaps we would be better to continue this somewhere else ?

[kiterunner]

You can post those questions on the Research Questions board, Marquette.

[marquette]

I guess so, some of them are already in my TOGG posts though. I was trying to think of a different sort of challenge, that's all.